


and the world spins madly on (or, 5 times natasha drove clint to drink, and one time natasha got tipsy)

by andibeth82



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: 5+1 Things, Angst, Clint Needs a Hug, Drinking to Cope, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, F/M, Implied/Referenced Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Post-Avengers (2012), Prompt Fill, dark!fic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-02-16
Updated: 2014-02-16
Packaged: 2018-01-12 18:07:02
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,711
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1194546
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/andibeth82/pseuds/andibeth82
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Post Avengers. The road to recovery is paved with more than just regret.</p>
            </blockquote>





	and the world spins madly on (or, 5 times natasha drove clint to drink, and one time natasha got tipsy)

**Author's Note:**

  * For [AlphaFlyer](https://archiveofourown.org/users/AlphaFlyer/gifts).



> Written for the **be_compromised** 2014 Valentine's Promptathon.
> 
> Thank you to [bobsessive](bobsessive.tumblr.com) and [enigma731](http://archiveofourown.org/users/enigma731) for ideas, beta, cheerleading, and most of all, for not being afraid to tell me when things don't make sense.
> 
> This is [probably] not the fic you were looking for.  
>  
> 
>  _“The world spins. We stumble on. It is enough.”_  
>  — Colum McCann, Let the Great World Spin

I.

 

When all is said and done and he’s got an idea of just how badly their bodies have been beaten and just how much she’s sacrificed to bring him home, they end up in a shitty bar in Hells Kitchen, one of the only places that’s still open and far enough away to not have been demolished by Tony’s repulsor rays or Thor’s lightning or Steve’s vibranium shield or Clint’s arrows or Natasha’s guns or Bruce’s fist. It’s one of those places Clint would’ve found himself frequenting a few years ago, before life really turned itself around, when he would leave the S.H.I.E.L.D. office afterhours and wander around aimlessly until he found the seediest possible bar with the seediest possible waitress, a broken jukebox and rundown décor.

Natasha slides into the seat nearest the door and he slides onto the stool next to her, orders two shots of vodka and knocks them both back without comment. When Clint goes for another round, he pushes one in her direction.

“Hell of a way to toast the end of the world,” Clint says, raising a glass before he drinks. And drinks, and drinks, and drinks. Natasha clinks her glass back and says nothing, her eyes bright with tears she can’t quite shed.

Later, she carries him home and holds him while he cries.

 

II.

 

Natasha arrives at exactly eight in the morning, pounds on the door of his apartment like she’s trying to break it down until she finally resigns herself to using the key he can’t even remember giving her, because it’s been that long since she’s had to let herself in on her own.

“You have your psych eval in an hour,” she says, walking inside without saying hello, crossing her arms over her chest with a hard stare. “And I’m not feeding Medical an excuse about how you can’t get out of bed.”

“I’m out of bed,” Clint grumbles, rubbing a hand across his face as he stumbles from the bedroom, not really giving a damn that he’s wearing the same clothes he knows she saw him in three days ago when she came by to check in. “Didn’t say I wanted to _go_.”

“Do you think I give a damn whether or not you want to go?” Natasha asks, raising a brow. “You’re going whether or not I have to tase you and drag you there myself.”

“Pity the poor man who has to help the agent who had a god in his brain,” Clint mutters, grabbing a fresh tee shirt and disappearing into the bathroom. He doesn’t bother making himself that presentable, but he does do enough so that no one can accuse him of not having left the house or not having showered for longer than would be considered acceptable.

“Fifteen minutes,” Natasha says when he comes out, spinning on her heel and slamming the door behind her. Clint groans to himself, slumping down in the kitchen chair and resting his forehead in his hands.

It’s a bad idea. It’s a really bad idea and he knows it, can feel the words at the edge of his brain with their warnings, one voice vaguely resembling Natasha’s deep huskiness, but he shoves them all aside as he tips back the bottle, feeling the warmth of the alcohol as it slides down his throat.

Thirteen minutes and twenty-five seconds before he knows Natasha is going to walk in the door and (most likely) hold him at gunpoint, he slides warily off the chair and grabs his coat.

If she asks, he’ll blame the sudden headache on what he knows is waiting for him, and not the bottle of nine percent alcohol he’s just consumed.

 

III.

 

His first solo mission after New York isn’t entirely solo – he’s got an extraction team waiting for him and Natasha on his comm, her voice a steady heartbeat in his ear, her being not physically in his presence but everything else about her close enough help him through whatever might unexpectedly paralyze him.

(Just because they cleared him for active duty, he knows, doesn’t mean he’s _cured_.)

He didn’t think he was ready to be back – he fought everyone that said otherwise, until Natasha convinced him that this was something that needed to happen, that if he didn’t do it, he’d never get himself back on track. So he goes with the reassurance of having help at his side, and in the end, to everyone’s surprise (including his own) he performs better than he expects, only has a problem with one assailant when an arrow misses its mark thanks to shaky fingers, because there’s something in the man’s narrow, white face that reminds him too much of glowing eyes and the long, dark hair of mischievous gods. Natasha helps pull him out of his head before any potential damage can happen and Hill curtly sends him praise over email. After it all, Clint retreats back to his hotel, and once he’s safely ensconced in the room he pulls out a small flask from the pocket of his suitcase.

“You can’t see it, but I’m drinking in your honor,” he says, Natasha still attached to his comm even though the rest of the channels have gone dark. He hears her laugh softly.

“Pick up your damn phone, Barton.”

Clint looks down at the bed, where his cell phone is vibrating silently against the covers, the large, fluorescent screen a bright glowing square. He picks it up curiously as Natasha’s face comes into focus, and he has to laugh. For all of the high powered Stark tech that S.H.I.E.L.D. has provided them with over the years, he can count on the fingers of one hand the amount of times they’ve used the video chat feature on their respective smartphones.

“I’m drinking in yours,” she says, shifting so that he can see that there’s a half drained bottle of whiskey sitting on the counter.

Clint balks. “That was full when I left this morning. Did you drink that whole thing while I was in the field?”

“Maybe,” Natasha says, completely serene and composed, and he’s instantly jealous as he feels his vision go hazy.

“Fuck Russians,” he manages before finishing off his own drink, the weight of the day and its demons lifted just enough.

 

IV.

 

He avoids it all damn day – the parade, the speeches, the public accolades. He’s hoped that maybe with so much time having passed, people would forget, move on and clean up, and he could live his life in the sort of bubble of peace that he found came with being one of S.H.I.E.L.D.’s most notable agents (which now apparently, according to Fury, included a side of “Superhero Responsible For Saving New York.”)

But then he gets the call, the invitations to the day dedicated to The Avengers because lest anyone in the entire Tri-State Area (and the country) forget, _they saved the damn world_ , and it’s all a little unnerving for Clint, who stands on the makeshift podium in Central Park with Natasha at his side, her hand curling into the small of his back, uneasy at the number of eyes on him and feeling like he’s back in the circus all over again.

Natasha insists that they go. She insists because it’s important for him to be in the public eye, because everyone else is going and because it would look supremely bad if he didn’t, because she really doesn’t see a reason he _can’t_ go, and mostly because she doesn’t want to stand up there pretending that she did all of this alone.

(The last one almost gets him, but he manages to control himself.)

Clint lets Tony take most of the attention, knows that if there’s anything Stark’s good at, it’s massaging the public’s admiration. For the first time in his life, Clint’s glad to let him take the reigns and doesn’t even feel half bad for Pepper, who stands in the background with a plastered-on smile he recognizes all too well from his own experiences.

He somehow makes it through the afternoon without making himself look like too much of an idiot, and afterwards, Tony invites everyone back to Stark Tower for celebration and a much-needed night of relaxation. He’s never been so glad in his life to see the billionaire’s never-ending supply of booze, and when Natasha finds him hiding out in one of the vents, he’s already finished off at least one bottle of wine.

“This is because you made me stand up there like a goddamn celebrated hero when I didn’t deserve it,” he says as she crawls in next to him, wrapping her arms around his body. Natasha shakes her head.

“It’s because this battle wasn’t mine alone, and I can’t pretend otherwise,” she says softly, watching as he finishes his drink.

 

V.

 

They’ve been spending more time in each other’s homes since New York, which is not exactly a new thing, not really. But while Clint’s used to showing up at her apartment after hours, for dinner or bullshitting or just to talk about missions, Natasha rarely shows up at his without a specific reason.

“One day, I’m going to get you out of this Bed-Stuy hellhole,” she says with a frown when he lets her in, and he goes through the practiced motions of pretending to be shocked and hurt by her begrudging comments.

 _Only until you get a handle on yourself_ , she says when she starts spending the night, which turns into three days, which then turns into two weeks. Clint doesn’t mind, isn’t going to kick her out anytime soon, but he knows how much of an annoyance it is to travel to him and so he tries to make it up to her by being as amicable as possible, ordering things other than Chinese and watching things other than _Dog Cops_.

It’s a full month before they attempt to sleep together for the first time since Loki, and surprisingly, it’s Natasha who makes the first move, her hands trailing down his stomach and finding purchase on the waistband of his boxers. He closes his eyes at her touch, rolls over to kiss her gently while her hands continue to explore his body, gentle and soothing at the same time. He feels himself go hard almost instantly and pulls away before she can go any further, doubling back on himself and leaning against the headboard.

“What’s wrong?” Natasha asks quietly, her lips hovering over his collarbone. He shakes his head.

“Give me a minute?”

She slides off him skeptically, allowing him his space as he swings his body off the bed, padding into the kitchen and hoping desperately that she won’t follow. Opening the cupboard, he drags down a bottle of Patrón and pours himself a small shot, knocking it back. He stands there leaning against the counter, breathing heavily, unmoving until Natasha’s arms wrap around his waist, pulling him back against her warm, naked skin.

“I’m sorry,” he says, turning around, aware of what he looks like, of what she’s seeing. “I just…he said…”

“I know what he said,” she replies softly, running a hand down his arm. “Because he said the same thing to me.” She pauses, tangling her hands in his hair. “It doesn’t mean I trust you any less, though.”

She pushes the bottle aside and kisses him again, and suddenly, there are different feelings spreading through his body, ones that he knows will leave a different type of hangover in the morning than what he’s normally used to.

 

I.

 

The nightmares aren’t new.

Natasha knows this – _knew_ this – she knows what to deal with and what to expect, she’s lived through it herself and she knows his experiences won’t be different. If anything, she suspects they’ll be worse, simply because unlike her years of brainwashing and learning to live with the mistrust and terror, he hasn’t ever known what it feels like to lose yourself and have to find your way back.

For the most part, she doesn’t feel like it’s anything that she can’t handle. But one night it’s worse than most, and she wakes up having to pry his hands from around her neck, her reflexes kicking in just enough so that she gets her wits about her before he can do any real damage.

She roughly shakes him off with more force than she means, pushing him down hard so that he falls back onto the covers with a grunt. Natasha uses the moment and the repreive to bolt from the bed and into the kitchen, where she gropes in the dark for the handle of the cupboard she knows houses his liquor. She doesn’t bother with finding a glass, just downs half a bottle of the first thing she finds and then curls up on the couch, closing her eyes against horrors she doesn’t want to think about.

“ _Yebat_ ,” she mutters as she feels the cushion shift slightly next to her, his weight sinking in and his hand on her back.

“You’re drunk,” Clint says, carding fingers through her hair. Natasha sits up straighter.

“I’m not,” she fights back, closing her eyes against the way the room shivers slightly, and Clint smiles.

“You’re _tipsy_.”

“You’re awake,” she replies pointedly, curling her legs onto the couch. He looks down, his eyes betraying the question she knows he doesn’t know how to ask, until he does.

“Was it bad?”

“Yes,” she admits, mostly because she can, because part of their deal for this includes the fact that he gets no special treatment, that she gets to be brutally honest about what he says and does when he loses control. She sighs, blowing air through her teeth. “It hurts, seeing you like this. What he’s done to you.”

“You mean how he’s turned me into an alcoholic?” Clint asks bitterly as Natasha rolls her eyes, fighting the spinning room syndrome that’s not entirely familiar to her.

“Not what I meant, Barton.”

“My liquor cabinet says otherwise.”

Natasha moves her tongue around in her mouth, chewing mentally on words she’s not sure how to express.

“I don’t have bad days,” she says finally, her voice a quiet light in the dark. “I don’t care about people enough – things don’t stay with me the way they stay with someone else.” She raises her eyes, a feeling of heaviness settling into her chest, into the space where it’s otherwise so easy to draw breath. “I was in Russia, when Coulson called. I yelled at him, actually – told him I was working, I was upset that he would even think to try to pull me out of a mission I had been on for days, when he knew better. And then he told me what happened to you, and that…that was a bad day,” she finishes, her tone unchanging. She lets herself pause, the remainder of her words resting on her tongue. “You might be killing your liver, but at least your mind isn’t in the hands of a god.” Her lips quirk into a smile that feels slightly forced, that she knows he can see the truth behind, because he’s him and they’re them. “Doesn’t that count for anything?”

Clint shrugs, his shoulders hovering somewhere up by his ears. “Guess so,” he returns quietly as he meets her eyes, letting his body sag with the weight of the response. He gestures towards the bottle that she’s left opened on the coffee table in front of her, the light from the outside window casting moonlit shadows around it.

“You gonna finish that?”

“What, you want me to _actually_ get plastered?” Natasha asks tiredly, with all the sarcasm she can muster. She shakes her head, her fingers twisting around his own. “I’ll help you finish, though. If you want.”

Clint leans over, picking up the bottle with his free hand as she scoots closer, nestling herself against his bare chest. In silence, they pass the bottle back and forth, finding sanctuary in shared secrets, in fear and support, in the parts of each other that they struggle to keep hidden because they’re afraid of where their demons might lead.

 

 

**Author's Note:**

> The (joking) alternate title to this fic during its inception was "Clint Barton needs to join AA," thanks to the unintentional through line this story took on. All kidding aside, I thought it was interesting to explore how post-NY Clint might deal with his demons in a very real way that someone wouldn't necessarily expect - and what Natasha's reaction would be as a caregiver and as someone who had been through these things herself.


End file.
